


Live For Today

by The_Word_Arranger



Category: Starfighter (Comic)
Genre: M/M, lots of feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-19
Updated: 2013-10-19
Packaged: 2017-12-29 21:50:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1010524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Word_Arranger/pseuds/The_Word_Arranger
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Encke and the Fighters stage an intervention on the eve of battle.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Live For Today

**Author's Note:**

> Back again, and wow that didn’t even take a week. This fan fiction is dangerous stuff. :D 
> 
> This is not beta-ed, so all mistakes mea-culpa and whatnot. 
> 
> There are more bad words and suggestive situations, but it is still so very tame.
> 
> This fic makes reference to Nothing_but_the_Rain’s omfg story Yoghurts, which you should all go read right now. Or maybe you should read it after this because that one is happy and this one is sort of not.
> 
> All love to HamletMachine!

Encke sat on the prow of the Equinox and stared out the loading bay door into the darkness beyond. It looked, he reflected, just like every other bit of outer space he had ever seen in his life: black, endless and mostly empty. It was called space for a reason but, despite the unquantifiable vastness of the universe, there didn’t seem to be enough of it for the Colterons and the Humans to coexist. 

He’d come down to the loading bay to run diagnostics on his Fighter interface, checking and re-checking the calibration and the power output and the weapon relays and everything else he could think of right down to the position of his seat. In the end, there was only so much he could do. When the time came and they flew into battle, he would put his life in Keeler’s gentle hands and pray to a god he only half believed in that they would come back alive. Out here on the edge of war, the only certainty was chaos.

* 

Entering Colteron space had been anticlimactic. There was no border, no sensor buoys and no red alert, nothing to mark the passing of the Sleipnir into enemy territory. Truth was that no one even knew exactly where the border was because almost no one had crossed it before. Still, the crew seemed to feel the change. There was an edginess to them all that hadn’t been there a few days ago, an apprehension that poisoned the air until it was positively suffocating. 

The Sleipnir slipped quietly into the unknown and Encke wondered if any of them would make it back.

*

It was long past midnight when Keeler finally stumbled into their quarters. Standing in the doorway with the harsh light from the hallway backlighting him, Encke thought he looked like a ghost. The only bits of color left on him these days were the dark circles under his eyes, and the redness in them that washed out their beautiful blue. Both were courtesy of too much time spent staring at computer screens and too little sleep, but Keeler would not be pried from his duties. The new engine design was finished, approved and installed, but all the technology on Earth and off it was useless if no one knew how to use it. It ran on the same principles as the original interface, but the nuances of it were different enough that even Commander Cook was worried. Keeler and his Navigators spent hours every day in simulation training, attempting to learn new reflexes and override old muscle memory by sheer force of will. They were all exhausted, overwrought and terrified. 

Keeler put up a brave front in public. He led by example, training harder and longer than anyone else; he had a smile for every worried face he encountered and an encouraging word for every moment of despair. He was a bastion of strength for his frazzled Navigators, but Encke could see the cracks in his façade when they were alone together. Keeler was not naïve. He knew as well as Encke did that this was almost certainly a suicide mission, but he could not, would not, surrender to his fear with so many people looking to him for hope.

Keeler fell into their shared bed fully clothed and was asleep between one breath and the next. Encke sat up, removed Keeler’s boots and tucked his head under his chin. Even in sleep, Keeler’s shoulders were tense from the weight of responsibility he carried and his jaw was clenched tight. His hair fell over his shoulder in a frizzy braid, and his bangs were tangled and dirty when Encke ran his fingers through them. Keeler loved his hair and normally took impeccable care of it. Each crew member was allowed fifteen pounds of personal luggage in addition to the regulation requirements, and you could learn a lot about a person by what they packed. Navigators mostly brought data sticks full of books, movies, music and games, while Fighters tended towards cigarettes, booze and porn. Keeler devoted most of his to conditioner and he hoarded it like gold. Now his hair was brittle and lifeless, and Encke tried so hard not to make comparisons to the rest of him. 

Tomorrow would come, the battle would come and one way or another, this would all be over. Encke held his lover close to his heart and couldn’t sleep.

*

Physical training the next morning was a welcome relief. Encke channeled all his anger and worry into his workout, and was actually feeling a little better by the time he was finished. He headed to grab some lunch and immediately regretted it. The Mess Hall was mostly filled with Navigators but instead of their normal cheerful chatter, the room was as silent as a tomb. Abel was staring at a tablet propped up against his coffee cup, but his eyes were glazed over and his hands were twitching in front of him like he was at his Navigator helm. Porthos dragged his spoon around and around in his lumpy oatmeal while Phobos stared at a wall, for once without something to say. Ethos was asleep on the table. They all looked like they had already lost, defeated by expectations in the face of overwhelming odds.

Encke retreated from the mess and put out the announcement for an emergency Fighter’s meeting in an hour.

*

They met in the Fighter’s briefing room, tired and jumpy but so much better off than their Navigators. Encke walked to the front of the room and waited until he had their attention before starting.

“Listen up. You know by now that we’ve entered ‘Teron space. We’re pretty far from any of their outposts right now, but that’s not gonna last. The Baten Kaitos System is in the heart of their territory and there is still plenty of space between us and it. Sooner or later, they’re gonna notice us; it’s just a waiting game now and I want everyone ready when the time comes.”

“So what’s the plan? More training sims?” The Fighter who spoke up sounded less than thrilled. “The Navies have been in there round the clock hogging all the spaces. Mine almost cried when I tried to kick him out. Too fucking high-strung or some shit.” 

Encke ground his teeth together. “Did you even bother to ask why they’ve been in there so much?” The Fighter’s sudden interest in his boots indicated that not only was the answer no, but that it would have never even occurred to him to ask on his own.

Encke resisted the urge to punch the fuckhead in the face. God, were they all that stupid? They couldn’t possibly be that out of touch with their Navigators and expect to work well together. He knew the stereotypes as well as anyone: tough, strong Fighters and quick, intelligent Navigators. There was more than a little truth there, as there often was with stereotypes, but he and Keeler had made it clear to their men that there was no room on the Sleipnir for stupid Fighters or weak Navigators. Just because you had someone around to compensate for your weaknesses didn’t mean that you had to let those flaws cripple you. 

“There’s been a major engine design overhaul. They’re in their ‘hogging’ the sim stations learning how it works so they can keep our asses alive. Show some goddamn respect.” Encke knew that the relationship he shared with his Navigator was a rare, special thing, though the Reliant crew and a few others were starting to give off vibes. Most of the Fighters were at least friendly with their Navigator counterparts, and even among those who couldn’t really stand each other, there was grudging respect. Unfortunately, the Fighters tended to forget these sentiments when they gathered together in masses of black-clad stupidity. Encke didn’t know if it was testosterone, the need to prove that they were more than trained monkeys, or the belief that showing any kind of emotion would turn them into pansy-asses, but the lack of public respect among the Fighters for their Navigators made Encke’s hands itch to knock heads together. Their Navigators deserved so much better and today, Encke was going to make sure they got it. 

“I’m cancelling the schedule for the rest of the day. Your new orders are simple: find your Navigator and get them away from their work. I don’t care if you have to physically drag them out from behind their computers; we’re all done for the day. Make sure they eat, make sure they sleep. Do whatever you need to do to get their minds off this shit. They wanna talk, you talk. They wanna play chess, you play chess. They wanna fucking paint their nails then yours better match.” The look on Encke’s face dared them to disagree.

“Show them you appreciate all the hell they’re putting themselves through. Remember that they hold your lives in their hands and give them the support they’ve earned. Prove to them that you’re worth it.”

Encke paused and looked around the room, letting his eyes make contact with a few certain individuals. “And for those of you dumb shits lucky enough to have something real with your Navigator, make sure you tell them because there is a very real probability that this will be your last chance.”

“No regrets men. Dismissed.”

*

They ended up crashing the Navigator’s yoga class. It looked like they were winding down anyways so Encke didn’t feel too bad about disturbing them when they were actually doing something besides working. The Fighters filed into the back of the room, and Encke approached Keeler where he was curled into Child’s Pose at the front of the class. Keeler looked up and frowned. “I heard you called an emergency meeting. Is it bad?” Encke took in Keeler’s face, the sunken cheekbones, the pale lips, the eyes that looked like they had been punched and concluded that it was pretty damn bad. 

Encke helped Keeler to his feet and turned to look back at the rest of the room. Most of the Navigators were sitting up now and looking confused when they spotted Encke and the rest of the Fighters. “This is the emergency.” Encke made a broad arm gesture to encompass the room and everyone in it.

Keeler made a rude noise and started rolling up his mat. “I don’t care how bad your experience in here was, yoga is not an emergency requiring your attention.” Encke thought back to that time and wondered if he should have brought all the Fighters in earlier to participate just to amuse the Navigators. Granted, they would have been laughing at his Fighter’s expense, but they would have been laughing and it would have been an improvement. Encke set that thought aside for another time, realized that there probably wouldn’t be another time, and then firmly shoved that thought out of his mind.

Now that the rest of the Navigators were up and moving again, it was pretty clear that at least three of them had fallen asleep on the floor. The rest were milling about as if they weren’t quite sure what to do with themselves. Encke sighed. “Keeler, you and your men can’t go into battle like this. You need food and sleep and you all need to relax for a bit. You’re not going to do anybody any good like this.”

Keeler swung back around from where he was storing his mat to face Encke and his face was filled with so much pain and rage that Encke took a step back. “What do you want me to do?” Keeler hissed. “Do you think we’re up twenty hours a day, training in the sims for fun? Maybe you and yours are all set for this fight, but then they didn’t just change over everything you spent years studying. Central just came in, dropped this new system in our laps and went on their merry way, and now we’re scrambling for understanding so that we don’t all just go out there and die tomorrow. We are doing everything we can to try and come back alive, and now you come in here and tell me that I’m not doing any good but just what the hell do you expect me to do?” Keeler was practically shouting now and it only told Encke how bad things really were. Keeler never shouted, he got calm and quiet and then made you really regret being a fuck up, but he never lost control like this. Everyone was staring at them now; Keeler was breaking and Encke did the only thing he could think of to do. He grabbed Keeler by the shoulders, pulled him against his chest and gently kissed him. 

Keeler sagged into Encke’s strong embrace, returning the kiss for a brief moment before burying his face in Encke’s neck. Encke wrapped his arms around him and they stood there in front of everyone, just holding each other for a long moment. “What do you want me to do?” Keeler didn’t sound angry this time, just defeated and so lost. 

“I got this,” Encke said. He stepped back from Keeler and addressed his men. “You have your orders so hop to it.” 

The Fighters spread out across the room, quickly finding their Navigators and helping them to their feet. The Navigators rolled up their mats, grabbed their water bottles and allowed themselves to be led away. Most of the group turned left out the door towards the Mess Hall, on their way to complete the first part of their mission. Encke watched the pairs leave, black and white together, and felt balance returning to his soul. This was how it should be. 

He turned back to his own white half and held out his hand. 

“Come on angel.” 

*

Keeler was asleep on his feet by the time they got back to their quarters, but he perked up a little when Encke promised to wash his hair. They stripped down quickly and Encke took a brush to the incredible tangles in Keeler’s braid while the shower warmed. Once in, Encke leaned Keeler’s head back into the spray until his hair fell heavy with water, and then started rubbing shampoo into it. He massaged the neglect from his hair, rubbing his fingers against Keeler’s scalp and down to press against the knots in his neck. He let Keeler rinse his hair while he grabbed the conditioner. It smelled of juniper and mint: earthy, clean and alive. He finger combed it in, relishing in the feel of Keeler’s hair between his fingers and admiring the way it fell across his back in abstract lines. He left the conditioner in while he washed his own short hair before rinsing his and then Keeler’s hair clean. They took their time in the shower, running soapy hands over each other, chaste and intimate and everything they both needed. Together, they let their stress and their fears for tomorrow wash down the drain with the dirt.

The hot water finally ran out and with it went Keeler’s last wind. Encke shut the shower off before grabbing two towels and gently drying their bodies. Keeler was too tired to walk, swaying gently on his feet so Encke simply pick him up and carried him to their bed. He spread the drier of the two towels over Keeler’s pillow so that his damp hair wouldn’t completely soak it, and then rolled them both under the covers. Keeler snuggled close, mumbling a soft “thank you love” before drifting off, and Encke fell asleep feeling like he had finally accomplished something.

*

Hush now; lay your head down.  
The world keeps on turning, the nights come around.  
Though the sky is dark, the moon still shines bright;  
Close your eyes, fall asleep safe in its light.  
And rest peacefully, dream beautifully,  
Know I will guard you the rest of the night.  
Till the morning light, I’ll keep you from harm,  
Whatever may happen remember you’re safe in my arms.


End file.
